


there’s a beauty to graceless hunger

by shatou



Category: Hannibal (TV)
Genre: Angst with a Happy Ending, Confusing dream sequences, Dream Sex, M/M, Medical Procedures, Murder Husbands, Post-Fall (Hannibal), disorientation, kind of
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-06-30
Updated: 2020-06-30
Packaged: 2021-03-04 03:01:06
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,196
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24996523
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/shatou/pseuds/shatou
Summary: They fall and rise anew. Perhaps for the last time, likely for the best.
Relationships: Will Graham/Hannibal Lecter
Comments: 2
Kudos: 21





	there’s a beauty to graceless hunger

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you Lisa for listening to me scream about this for days! Sorry I couldn’t finish the whole thing :”

Blood shines on their skin like molten jewels. Sticky, slippery, warm, coppery. Will lays his head on Hannibal’s shoulder and Hannibal, in all his beastly glory, lays his hands on Will light and hesitant as though Will might filter through the crack of his fingers. Like sand or water, or blood. Will grapples blindly at it until he feels Hannibal’s hand on the small of his back, secure. _I want this_ , Will thinks, _I want this not._ They sway delicately at the very edge between earth and sky. _I want this. I want this not._ The pain of his injured body eats at him from extremities towards core. Hannibal’s breath by his ear shapes itself into Will’s name. _I want this, I want this not._ Will feels his feet lift. Only one step to take. Forward, or backward?

_I want this_. He steps backward.

He tugs Hannibal and they stumble back. Hannibal presses against him, warm blood on his stomach. “You need to...”, Will rasps, to which Hannibal nods at once, not another word needed. They stagger inside, and Will lays Hannibal on the nearest couch. “Where do you keep your medical supplies?” Speaking pulls at the gash on his face; it stings sharply.

Hannibal points him in the right direction and Will turns his back to him without sparing him a glance. His mind is made of over-saturated footages taped together, fast-forwarding back and forth unintelligibly. He’s floating in his own body, gathering bandages and cloth and filling a basin of water and feeling nothing of the weight. By the time he hurries back to the couch, he still cannot bear to look Hannibal in the face. Hannibal is reclined prone and still, chest rising and falling, breath not hitched once under Will’s touch.

“Is your mind swallowing you up again, Will?”

Will doesn’t answer until a knuckle brushes along his unhurt cheek. Something primal within him snarls and holds him back, binds him to invisible walls, tugs his gaze to the ground, to his hands, to anywhere but Hannibal’s face. “If my mind is a beast then I’ve never been outside of its belly.”

Hannibal’s fingers are insistent on his skin. “Or perhaps it is the beast that has never been outside of your belly.”

_I want this_ , Will reminds himself. He has chosen to step backwards, and now they are here, and they shall have a few days, even a week, stowed away and safe to lick their wounds until the dust has settled enough for them to leave. “And now it is,” he answers. Smiling hurts, but he does anyway, soaking up the pain like it is something sweet.

“You’ve set it free.” Hannibal’s hand is a fleeting touch, gliding away from his face and falling over Will’s fingers, still hovering about Hannibal’s abdomen. Will’s eyes follow the movement as if hypnotized. Lights dim around them, coldness slowly sinking within and without. His gaze travels, and meets Hannibal’s eyes, open, glazed over, lifeless.

When Will opens his mouth, his scream collides with damp darkness. Everything lurches forward all of a sudden; Hannibal’s limp body spills from the couch and onto him. Will gasps in salt and the sea. His limbs are useless as though flailing in wet cement. He clutches Hannibal’s body to his chest and the rest of his consciousness goes out with the light, underwater.

  
  


Will awakens to the feeling of salt crusted on his lips.

There is sand in his ear, under his arms; there are rocks under his head, under his spine. A breeze tickles his eyelashes. His face stings from the scorching heat of the sun. It’s so bright on the other side, he can nearly see the veins on his eyelids. He doesn’t want to open his eyes. He doesn’t want to remember what happened, either, but it’s too late. Dread fills his chest. They were on the edge of the cliff, and he had asked himself a question. _Forward, or backward?_ He thought he’d made a choice, but he had never had one, had he? To lead a dance, one must step forward.

Will knows, bone-deep, that he is at the foot of the cliff.

He starts moving from fingertips to elbow, testing his body like it’s a marionette. His hand gropes around for a touch of skin, a lock of hair, even blood, anything. It’s already an alarming sign, that there is no physical weight atop his chest. _No, please._ His heart speeds. There is nothing within the span of his arms, nobody within reach. He’ll have to open his eyes now.

Will eases himself onto his side, on his unhurt shoulder. His body is a rusty suit of armor filled with glass. Sunlight sears against his cornea for a few laborious blinks. Then from incandescent blankness the landscape emerges line by line, waves frothing over a marbled beach of dark rock and white sand. Sounds fade in, a serene droning of endless nautical winds. Will grimaces. His joints grind like they’ve been fitted wrong. He hauls himself onto his feet, swaying in a wash of nausea. A sharp pain shoots up his left leg. He ignores it; he can still stand.

His eyes dart across the beach. Rocks and sand stretch from one end of his vision to the other. He squints so harshly the gash on his face pulls and weeps; he searches, nearly frantic, for any lump far too irregular for a rock. His eyes focus and unfocus, catching a dark, elongated figure. His fucked up ankle strains under his insistent steps. That’s it, he thinks. That’s it, Hannibal is right over there. Probably unconscious, or he would’ve responded. That’s fine. Will can carry him alright. He limps, all too glad to care. He’s ready to crouch down and check for a pulse.

It’s a scruffy bundle of seaweed. Inanimate, dried, _dead_.

Will glances up again as despair starts to set in his chest. Not a breathing organism in sight. Not a single soul. A stinging feeling blooms in his nose, tight in his throat, the familiar sensation of a perching scream. _Where are you?_ Silently, Will grits his teeth and shuffles away. He imagines being an albatross gliding in the air above. For half a second he saw himself stagger along the shore, battered and worn, clothes half sun-dried and dark with old blood. He contemplates turning around and walking back into the sea; he will tear up the ocean floor tile by tile if he must, wrench back what was his. But his vision clears as he persists on land, aimless save for the flutter of instincts at the back of his mind. Though the scent in the winds is mostly sea salt, there is something ferric about it too - and it is not his own blood that he smells, or so he hopes.

There isn’t enough sand for a complete trail of footprints. But here and there Will can see them, jagged pools of sand and the smallest dips of half a sole. Or he’s imagining it. He wants to laugh at his own rue. He doesn’t. He follows whichever signs he thinks he sees, and cuts diagonally across the beach, towards a formation of rocks that rises and rises and leads to a shallow cavity. There is more sand here… and more footprints, as Will approaches it sideways. The mouth of the cave arches modestly, almost like it’s trying to recoil from view. The shade is a relief from the sun. A pale figure is propped against the wall of the cave. Will's eyes blur. He's almost missed it.

Hannibal looks so innocent in his slumber.

His leg protests in vain. Will stumbles across the space and falls onto his knees, immediately reaching for Hannibal’s wrist. Just to make sure he hasn't imagined the faint pulse there, or the heartbeat, he leans close to Hannibal’s face. He feels the lightest of breaths. There are dried tracks on Hannibal's pallid cheeks. _Tears_. Will arranges himself between Hannibal and the cold, hard rock of the cave wall. His weight sinks down and exhaustion rushes up and he breathes out, drawing his arm around broad shoulders. Hannibal’s head lolls into the crook of his neck. Will turns, lips quivering where they press into fine hair. He closes his eyes before they water, wondering how long Hannibal has searched for him before ending up here.

  
  


_Only one step to take. Forward, or backward?_

I want this, _he thought, and stepped forward. Hannibal clutched at him by the waist, and he gripped Hannibal’s shoulder. It was almost adoring, the way they tangle._

_They crashed into the waves. Everything shattered around and within. Water frothed on his skin. He flailed, sobbing knives of seawater into his lungs, tears in his eyes and in his throat, the taste of salt and blood one same metallic tang. Hannibal slipped from his grip. Will couldn’t let him._ Hannibal _, he said, or thought._ Hannibal _, he screamed._ Come back to me. Come back to me…

“Come back to me,” he says, says out loud, his voice a distant echo in his own ears. A gentle hand comes to touch his face, palm pressed against his marred cheek. Will opens his eyes and a comfortable dimness opens therewith, staring back at him. He straightens. Hannibal’s face slowly outlines itself from the dark, backlit. His lips smile like half a moon and there’s an indulgence in his eyes that makes Will clench his jaws with aching tenderness.

“You fell asleep,” Hannibal says, simply. Will blinks, eyes traveling across the room, taking in the absurd ordinariness. Neat counters of granite and steel; rows of knives and racks of spoons and spatulas; indoors lights gleaming on pristine wood and glass. The kitchen of the cliff house is as innocuous and well-equipped as that of Lecter Manor, if not slightly more modern in décor. 

“For how long?”

“About fifteen minutes.” Hannibal, crisp in a dress shirt and a white apron, sits beside him at the table. He smells vaguely of olive oil. Will tries to remember beyond the relief that cloys his mind. All he finds are stretches after stretches of domestic tranquility. Nightmares are behind them now.

“Huh… Sorry,” Will mumbles. He meets the smile in Hannibal’s crinkled eyes.

“No need to apologize,” Hannibal singsongs. “Your timing is impeccable, Will. You woke up just in time.”

“In time for dinner?” Will guesses, and imagines he hears Hannibal chuckle. He feels a smile creeping to his lips involuntarily. He’s mirroring Hannibal, he knows. It’s only instincts. He thinks he hears glass breaking somewhere, muffled. He’s nonchalant to it. There is one presence that matters and it is before him now.

No, Hannibal doesn’t chuckle, but his hand lingers on Will’s face, inviting him to lean into the heat. It’s still all so dark, and he feels cold. Hannibal’s hand slips towards the back of his skull. He leans forward, testing the water. Hannibal tilts his head by way of answering. Their lips pillow together, slow at first then hunger follows. He snakes a hand around Hannibal’s waist and shifts from his seat, heedless of whether the chair can take their combined weight. Hannibal’s hand curls in his hair. Is this how far they have come? Will straddles him, licks into his pliant mouth, searching for that rush of heat.

“Will,” Hannibal sighs. Whether it is a yes or a no is beyond him, but as long as Hannibal does not protest, he doesn’t relent. _It’s so cold_ , Will thinks, hair rising on the back of his head as their breaths mingle. Hannibal squeezes his thighs and lifts them. Laughter tickles at the back of Will’s throat as he loops his arms around Hannibal’s neck and hooks his legs on Hannibal’s middle. Hannibal hoists him up, hands firmly on his ass. “Perhaps this will wake you up,” he says, somewhere in the middle of all this. They trade kisses and sighs and moans as they make their way back to the master bedroom, dinner forgotten.

Hannibal lays him down with the care reserved for plating a meal; opens him up layer by layer and Will savors the lightness of his touch, full of bated hunger. “Hurry,” yet Will says. It’s still so cold, but maybe that’s only an illusion. Hannibal smiles as a panther might and kisses Will in the middle of his chest, where it throbs, kisses Will on the smile across his stomach and down further. Sensations seem to come in shorter bursts, more ephemeral the more Will tries to hold onto each brush of lips on his thigh, each slide of slick fingers on sensitive skin. His efforts to tuck everything into his mind palace are fruitless; the moment echoes past him. _Hannibal_ , he breathes sharply, clawing at the puckered skin on Hannibal’s back, and Hannibal snarls and breaches his body.

“Stay with me,” Hannibal says, or maybe it is Will who whispers. He’s never sure who says what when they are one and whole like this, wearing each other’s sweat-damp skin and drowning in murmurs and groans. He feels hot all around him yet so terrifyingly cold inside, even as Hannibal drives into him, bends him over, consumes the soft cries from his lips. Warm tears drips on his face, and the world dissolves.

  
  


Will moans out. He awakens, again, to the feeling of salt crusted on his lips.

Coolness and darkness come hand in hand. _It’s so cold_ . Will takes in a breath too deep for his lungs, and grimaces, and the grimace pulls at the wound on his face and the gulp tears at his parched throat and everything hurts. He is propped up against an uneven surface, head pillowed on a rock. The cave, he is in the cave. _They_ are. He takes solace in the weight that remains solid in his arms. Hannibal’s breathing, light as it is, is the first sound he registers. Hair tickles his neck. Will opens his eyes. The barrel of a gun smiles back at him.

His arms draw tighter. He turns his body to shield the man he’s cradling. “N...o,” Will rasps. His gaze sharpens into a glare as he tries to make out the face above.

The gun lowers. “You need to take care of his injuries,” Chiyoh says, slowly crouching down. Her phrasing comes across like a _déjà-entendu_. Will narrows his eyes, breaths stuttering, knuckles white where his hand clutches at Hannibal’s shoulder.

“ _Your_ injuries,” she corrects, holding up a hand in the face of his distrust. Will’s mouth thins as Chiyoh takes out a flask from the inside of her coat and holds it to his lips. He relents, after a second. It takes him a few gulps for his voice to return.

“How did you find us?” He says, each word a scrape of sandpaper in his parched throat.

Chiyoh doesn’t say anything. She zips open a backpack and the air smells like a dentist’s room. “I looked for you,” she says matter-of-factly. “Your will is fickle. I’ve always known I couldn’t trust you, and I can see that I was right.”

Will doesn’t bother to ask if she trusts him now. Their mutual distrust fades into the background as he finally lets go of Hannibal and lays him down on the cleanest, driest part of the ground. Chiyoh slices Hannibal’s shirt open and presses along his abdomens, muttering something like, _No longer guarding_ ; checking the gunshot wounds, exit and entry. Though the skin has wrinkled from submersion in water, the edges are still ragged, the flesh around them rigid but unbruised. Behind clumps of oxidized blood, bright crimson still threatens to ooze.

“He has lost a lot of blood,” Chiyoh says. There’s probably a risk of infection too, Will figures without her saying. He doesn’t need to look to feel the accusation in her eyes. He flexes his hand, eyeing Hannibal’s pale wrists, then looks away and reaches for the backpack instead, fishing out water and some painkillers. He takes them, and cleans his own wounds and stitches them up clumsily, too worn to wait for the meds to kick in.

“Check your leg,” she says without looking at him. Will runs a finger over his swollen ankle. It’s all bruised and feels tender, palpitating with numbed pain signals at the lightest of presses.

“Fracture or sprain?” She asks.

“Fracture.”

Chiyoh nods her acknowledgement. She doesn’t really speak to him aside from terse orders. She tells him to hand her a cloth. Will does. She tells him to take out a roll of bandage and another bottle of water. He does. By the time she tells him to look into the duffle bag and get Hannibal a clean shirt, the wound has been dressed crisp and clean. And without telling him, she shifts to the side, only helping him as he takes on the task, tugging the pullover onto Hannibal. He smooths out the fabric as well as the cropped locks over Hannibal’s forehead. Behind him, Chiyoh clears up the dirty cloths and cotton balls. Bags are zipped up; her clothes rustle lightly when she rises.

“Carry the bags and I’ll carry him,” she offers.

“No,” Will says, and hauls himself onto his feet. He looks back at her. Predictably, she looks confused. “No, I’ll carry him,” he repeats, slowly.

Chiyoh watches him manoeuvre Hannibal onto his back. Her look says, _I’ll kill you if you drop him_ , but she says nothing, merely fixes the strap of her gun and heaves the bags over her shoulder. Will’s stomach clenches with dread as he tries to be as careful and gentle as possible. Chiyoh’s car is parked not far away, shrouded in the shades. Will focuses on Hannibal’s weight blanketed over his back, holds onto his warmth like a prayer. He doesn’t notice when his knees almost buckle at some point, but he has to know, at all moments, that Hannibal is still breathing.

It’s a feat and a half to get Hannibal’s limp body into the car. Even after three years locked up in a cell, Hannibal is still all dense mass of bone and muscles, skin feverish hot and gut tender. Will lets out a breath, locks the car doors. Chiyoh starts up the car, and it’s all silence save for the sound of the waves that slowly fades away with the distance they put between themselves and the shore. Will doesn’t mind. He’s busy keeping Hannibal’s head upright - propping it back in place every now and then - as the ride grows bumpy. 

“Hold his hand,” Chiyoh says, out of nowhere. Will snaps his head up, startled more than confused. “You will need to do more than that to prevent hypothermia,” she explains without looking at him, “especially when he’s disrobed while you change his bandages. You can pre-warm blankets.”

“Got it,” Will mumbles, not sure if she hears. He knows he doesn’t need for an excuse - from her or from anyone, truly - but he waits for her next words, anyway.

“He will be cold,” she sighs. There’s something oddly soft worming its way into her impersonal tone. “Hold him, Will.”

Will does.


End file.
